Recently ceramics have been used to make computer components such as disks and E-blocks for hard drives. Ceramics are starting to be used instead of metals (e.g., aluminum) for these components because of their low density and high stiffness. However, ceramics generally have a low toughness (i.e., break easier than metals) and are difficult and costly to form into the final component shape.
More recently an infiltrated aluminum-boron carbide (ABC) composite has been utilized for the above computer components (U.S. Pat. No. 5,672,435). These composites overcome some of the problems of ceramics such as difficulty in forming the part. However these composites require a substantial amount of costly fine boron carbide powder. Also, in making high stiffness ABC composites, almost all of the aluminum must be reacted to form aluminum boride, aluminum borocarbide or aluminum carbide ceramic phases. Consequently, the high stiffness ABC generally has a low toughness and consequently breaks similarly to a ceramic.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a material that overcomes one or more of the problems of the prior art such as one of those described above. It would also be desirable to provide a method of preparing the material.